


Past Ain't Through With You

by benzos



Series: Run Like the Devil [2]
Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Abuse, Alternate Universe - Supernatural (TV) Fusion, Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Bad Dads, Canon-Typical Violence, Christmas, Demons, Domestic Violence, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Families of Choice, Holidays, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Magic, Multi, POV Harry, Past Abuse, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Supernatural Elements, Trauma, Witchcraft, and all that good stuff, little mix the coven, not graphic but better safe than sorry, seasonal angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-13
Updated: 2016-12-13
Packaged: 2018-09-08 06:06:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8833318
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/benzos/pseuds/benzos
Summary: He can’t quite explain why he feels odd when thinking about that part of Louis’ life—him and Zayn, on the run from Liam (Liam!) and the rest of the Feds—but he guesses it has something to do with the combination of fondness and hurt that flickers across Louis’ face whenever anyone brings it up, mostly other hunters who met him back then, or even earlier, when he was hunting with his dad. Those ones make Harry wish he could still kill people by looking at them. Well. Not that he ever had, actually, and he hadn’t tried, so he likes to think he had the ability and chose not to exercise it. He’d still kill for Louis in an instant; his returned humanity hasn’t drained the evil from him like he’d foolishly hoped. But he has a life now, which doesn’t count for nothing. And he has Louis, who counts for a lot.
       *Set a few months after the end of Run Like the Devil. The holiday season arrives and brings with it some not-so-welcome figures from Louis and Harry's pasts.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Hey y'all! I'm sorry this took so much longer than I planned--life, as it tends to do, got in the way. Damn school. Big big love to everyone these last few days; the outpouring of love and support I've seen just continues to astound me and I hope you all know how amazing you are. Here to chat if anyone would like, as well.
> 
> As always, huge huge thanks to Kate (@five9) for being the greatest beta a girl could wish for and also just an awesome friend and person and fellow lesbian-who-feels-some-type-of-way-about-Louis-Tomlinson, I love her, so should all of you, I guarantee this story/series would not have reached completion (hahahhahaha SORRY) without her cheerleading and invaluable advice. 
> 
> [Here is the fic post, if you would like to reblog.](http://churchrat.tumblr.com/post/143407420900/fic-run-like-the-devil-hl-complete-twc)  
> And as always, feel free to come say hi to me on tumblr (@churchrat), or twitter (@lesbianalmighty, although i very rarely use it and am incapable of brevity).  
> PS BUY & STREAM JUST HOLD ON!

Louis’ been edgy since they got in the car, and it’s only amplifying as the miles tick by toward the New York border. Harry looks at him out of the corner of his eye, and decides against saying anything just yet. More than likely Louis will just snap and get even more nervous, then feel guilty about it later, and then what’s the point? At least the roads are fairly scenic; Louis is clearly stalling by avoiding the interstate, but Harry appreciates it, watching small towns flit past as they wind their way west through Massachusetts, the landscape becoming gradually more barren and craggy, hills and mountains that sort of remind Harry of when he’d go up to Scotland with his family to visit his mum’s friend in Edinburgh.

He likes it, he decides; he stuck mostly to California, before Louis, and he’s still attached to the West, but he finds he loves traveling now that he’s not desperately running away from anything—at least not in reality. He still wakes up, sometimes ( _often_ ) in a cold sweat, poised to sprint, halfway out of bed before he remembers himself, that he’s safe now, relatively speaking, and then Louis is roused by the movement, blinks awake and props his head up on his arm, murmurs _it’s okay_ or _you’re safe_ or _I gotcha_ or a million other platitudes that somehow are genuine, and he opens his arms for Harry to crawl into them if he chooses to, which he usually does. They settle into each other wordlessly, Louis sometimes humming under his breath in the dark if Harry’s particularly disquieted. He hasn’t said anything about it, and he bets Louis thinks he doesn’t notice, but Harry can tell that he stays awake until Harry goes back to sleep, each and every time.

They’d been in Boston the week before, tipped off by one of Niall’s friends about possible demon activity, although it ended up being a disgruntled ghost, much to Harry’s relief—the demons they ran into largely didn’t recognize him, but there was always the chance, always the fear. He tried not to think about where the soul might go once they destroyed the remains, focusing, as Louis did, on the people it had been terrorizing, all of whom were thankfully fine, at least physically. Harry always loves seeing Louis with children, the way he crouches down to their level to talk to them, listens with the utmost seriousness and focus to whatever they have to say, speaks to them gently and warmly but without condescension. He’s just good with them.

It’s not that Harry doesn’t understand Louis’ nervousness about staying with his family over Christmas—well, he doesn’t entirely get it, and he gets the sense that there’s a good part of it Louis’ not telling him—but he is kind of baffled by Louis’ worry that his youngest sisters might not like him. Phoebe and Daisy had gone up to their adoptive mother’s family home in Buffalo for Thanksgiving, which Louis and Harry spent with the Deakins, Lottie, and Fizzy, and the surprise addition of Fizzy’s girlfriend, whom she immediately introduced as such, holding up their linked hands between them and brightly saying, “Hi, this is my girlfriend Katie.”

Louis had frozen, mouth open like he was going to say something, eyes darting back and forth between Fizzy and Katie and Dan and Liz, who were, from the looks of it, entirely unfazed. Suddenly, Louis had turned on his heel and darted into the first room he found, which had been the coat closet in the front hallway, and Harry followed him without hesitation, shutting the door behind them and wrapping his arms around Louis in the cramped, overly warm space and standing there for who knows how long. Eventually, Louis’ breathing had slowed to a normal pace, and he had taken a deep breath, pulling away from Harry and scrubbing his hands over his face. “Sorry,” he said, voice a little high and shaky. “I’m acting crazy, sorry, just…it’s a lot.”

“I know,” Harry had said, quietly, and Louis hugged him again, nuzzling his face into Harry’s shoulder and breathing hotly.

“They know,” he said, so small Harry mostly felt it rather than heard it. “I mean, like, her girlfriend is here, for Thanksgiving, as her girlfriend.”

“Hmm.”

“I’m such a piece of shit.”

“No,” Harry protested, immediately.

“I’m happy for her,” Louis continued, as if Harry hadn’t said anything, and his voice was thick in the way it got when he was trying not to cry. “I’m just…I’m so fucking happy for her, but I’m…god, fuck, I’m jealous. How fucked up is that?”

Harry was quiet for a moment, considering. “It makes sense,” he said slowly, knowing that he had to find the right words for this. “I mean. That’s what you should’ve had.”

Louis was crying now, maybe only the third time Harry had seen him—or rather, felt him, because Louis was still hiding his face, but Harry’s shirt was getting damp, and Louis’ shoulders were shaking slightly—and it took Harry a few moments to make sense of what he said. “I thought he was gonna kill me.”

Harry didn’t need to ask who he was talking about. He felt himself tense; Louis rarely, if ever, talked about his father, although Harry frequently felt like there was a third person with them, only visible to Louis but insistent in its presence all the same. It was important that Harry respond to this the right way—at the very least, not the wrong way—lest he say something stupid and this part of Louis startled, stealing away and hiding from him for who knows how long (possibly forever).

“I’m glad he didn’t,” he murmured eventually, taking a chance and settling his hand on the back of Louis’ head, scratching softly. Louis didn’t flinch. “And you deserved better.”

Louis sighed, and Harry felt him begin pulling himself together, rolling his shoulders and straightening his back, taking deep breaths. “Sorry,” he said. “You shouldn’t have to deal with this shit.”

“I want to. And you deal with my shit constantly, so. That’s irrational.”

Louis made a sound that might’ve been a laugh. “That’s me. Great first impression, eh?”

Harry kissed the top of his head. He could sort of see Louis now, his eyes having adjusted to the dark. “You’re fine,” he said. “I’ve probably got you well beat on bad first impressions.”

“Fat fuckin’ chance. You’re stupidly charming.”

“Thanks,” Harry said. “You ready to go back out there?”

“Yeah,” Louis said, a hand cupped over his mouth, “yeah, I think so. Probably best to before I look even crazier.”

When they’d stepped back into the brightly lit hallway and Harry had stopped squinting, he saw Louis rubbing his hands together and putting on a small smile. His eyes were a little red, but probably not noticeable to anyone not looking for it. It just made the blue look brighter, anyway. He felt his own face tick up into a half-smile and said, “Lead the way.”

Louis said something about feeling ill, and no one pressed it. Dan and Liz were friendly and welcoming, and whilst Harry had already met Lottie and Fizzy, it was good to see them under less dire circumstances, and the anxiety he had felt about meeting Louis’ family, which he had tried his best to suppress so as not to make Louis even more distressed about it, gradually ebbed away, leaving him sitting at the circular dining table, next to Louis, a hand on his knee (Louis hadn’t specified their relationship, and Harry was glad of it, if a little wistful), surrounded by the controlled chaos of plates being passed and mash being scooped, eyeing a dish that appeared to be some kind of squash topped with marshmallows and which he was both intrigued and horrified by, and contentment settling over him, covering the ever-present fear and guilt like a thick blanket. A few times, he had thought about his own family, but those memories felt blunted, more tolerable than they used to be, and whenever he started to drift, Louis would squeeze his knee and reel him back in, finding a way to seamlessly bring Harry into the conversation, whatever it was.

After pie and ice cream—Harry was disappointed to find that he didn’t like pumpkin, although he had two helpings of apple, his sweet tooth having come roaring back to life in the last few months, which Louis gently teased him for but indulged, frequently, buying Harry all kinds of candy and insisting that he had to try everything so as to have the full human sensory experience—Louis and he spent what felt like an hour washing and drying dishes, which Harry didn’t mind and knew was important to Louis: to contribute somehow, to make himself useful, and, Harry suspected, to establish that he wasn't a guest.

The wreckage mostly cleared away, everyone had gathered in the living room to watch _A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving,_ which Harry had never seen but liked enormously, and there hadn’t been enough couch or chair space for everyone, so he went to sit on the floor, but Louis made an unhappy noise and pulled Harry half onto his lap. Lottie and Fizzy shared a significant look—Harry was reminded, suddenly, of Gemma, their conversations conducted entirely in facial expressions, and missed her fiercely—but no one else batted an eye.

Tentatively, Louis started to run his fingers through Harry’s hair, stopping every few moments to glance around the room, like he was checking if this was okay, how far he could go, but when Liz finally caught his eye, she just smiled and went back to watching the film, and Louis’ hands stayed in his hair through the rest of it. Harry, maybe predictably, found himself tearing up near the end.

“Are you crying?” Louis said, as the credits began to roll. He sounded like he couldn’t decide if he was worried or amused.

“No,” Harry said, jutting his lower lip out and wiping his eyes. Of course, he had to sniffle, then, for good measure. “Only a little.”

“I love you,” Louis had whispered into his ear. “Thank you for coming.”

They had left, then, both of them overwhelmed by the prospect of staying the night, and everyone had hugged both of them tightly. When the door closed behind them, Harry was startled by the sudden silence, his ears ringing. On the drive back to the motel he’d booked on the way, Louis was quiet in a way Harry couldn’t quite read. Since he wasn’t in obvious distress, Harry let him be. They both needed time to themselves, sometimes, at least mentally. That knowledge, unfortunately, didn’t keep him from careening towards the idea that _he_ had done something wrong that Louis was angry at him for, which led to him starting to hyperventilate just as they pulled into the parking lot, and Louis barely putting the car in park before kicking his door open in his haste to get to the passenger side, which had made Harry flinch, hating himself for it, but Louis just apologized and guided him into the room, sitting him down on the bed and talking to him—Harry can’t remember what about—until he had calmed, and they had gone to bed, and Louis had held him.

A strange thunk from underneath him startles Harry back to the present. He’s always been sort of…dreamy, he supposes, spending more time in his head than most people, but it’s gotten much more noticeable with his renewed humanity, constantly drifting in and out of his past, in and out of reality.

“Fuck,” Louis swears, hitting the button to turn on his hazards and pulling over to the shoulder, a horn blaring behind them. They skid to a stop—it’s icy, and for a heart-stopping second, it seems like they’re going to spin back into the road—and Harry lurches forward, the seatbelt holding him back and cutting harsh into his skin, knocking the breath out of him. It takes him a few moments to catch it, ringing in his ears and blurry images trying to push their way in front of his eyes.

“Harry,” Louis is saying, “H, are you okay? Can you hear me?”

Still winded, Harry manages to give him a thumbs up. Is Louis okay? He turns to look, blinking to try and get his eyes to focus; they’re swimmy with tears he didn’t realize were pooling. Louis has his worried face on, the urgent one he gets when he’s preparing to act quickly in case Harry’s seriously hurt, which he hasn’t really been—only a couple of broken ribs and sprained ankles—and Harry smiles to let him know he’s alright. “I’m fine,” he says, because Louis doesn’t look quite convinced. “Are you?”

Louis waves a hand, as if there’s no reason for Harry to ask. “I’m good,” he says. “Gonna try and see what’s wrong. Think we might’ve blown a tire. You good to stay here?”

“Good,” Harry says.

“Put your coat on,” Louis says after a moment. “Can’t have the heat on, and it’s fucking freezing.” Harry does as told, a flicker of warmth sparking in his chest at the mother hen part of Louis coming out.

It fades pretty quickly, though, once Louis’ outside. The cold snakes into the car, overpowering, and even worse is watching Louis grit his teeth moving through it, shivers wracking his whole body as he props the hood open—Harry can’t see him, then, and he’s not sure if that’s better. He shifts in his seat, trying to get a better angle. If he sits all the way at the edge, he can see one of Louis’ elbows. He jumps when the hood slams shut, a red-faced Louis frowning down at it and trudging back to the driver’s side, fumbling with the door for a second before yanking it open and sitting down heavily, cursing under his breath. He shakes the snow out of his hair—quite a bit has built up—and then curses some more as it splats all over the steering wheel and console. A scowl is truly settling into his brow, now, and Harry debates saying something, reaching out his hand; Louis is sort of unpredictable, and although he snaps less often than he used to when Harry tried to comfort him, it’s still a risk.

He doesn’t have to decide; Louis is the one who breaks the silence, declaring in a heavy—not angry—voice, “Left rear tire is flat, and the fuckin’ battery’s shot.”

Harry’s memories of being a demon are blurry, generally; the ones involving Louis are all he tends to really be able to focus on, to recall in more than suggestions of places, of sensations, of fear. A dead battery, Harry thinks, was the turning point for them.

It’s not a good memory, exactly—Harry had been terrified, in pain, paranoid and looking over his shoulder every few minutes despite his assurance that Louis’ car and Niall’s house were properly warded. It had been the closest she had come yet, then, to catching him, and he was desperate, ready to get on his knees—very literally, which disgusts him in retrospect, filling him with shame so hot he feels like he’s running a fever—and offer Louis anything he wanted, vulnerable and pleading under the hard distrustful stare and crossed arms. The closed-off exterior would crack occasionally, his face going soft before he seemed to remember himself and school it back into steeliness.

Harry could read souls, then, and Louis’ shone so brightly that it shone through the fine cracks in his attempt to conceal it, the way blinds can never keep all the light out. Harry saw the hardness for what it was—protective, defensive, learned from long-ago fear and pain—and he had sort of wanted to say, _I know you, we’re the same_ , (except they weren’t the same, Harry didn’t have a soul and was twisted, disfigured), but he had kept his mouth shut and gritted his teeth through Louis taking him back to Niall’s, carving a sigil into his arm, and stitching his wounds at first roughly, and then, seemingly without realizing, going gentle and careful—sweet, almost.

“H?”

“What?” Harry snaps out of it—he’d gone far away again, and he flushes. Louis doesn’t look upset with him, though, just a little concerned with a minute crease in his brow.

“You okay?” Face relaxing at Harry’s nod, he sighs and rests one hand on the steering wheel. “Where’d you go?”

Harry licks his lips, chapped and cracking painfully, even though he knows it only makes it worse. He keeps losing his Chapstick. “Thinking about, y’know. When I gave you a jumpstart.”

“Ah,” Louis says. “Guess you can’t, this time.”

A pang of guilt hits Harry squarely in the chest. “I’m sorry,” he says immediately, “I—”

Louis shakes his head. “You gotta stop apologizing for shit like this,” he says, voice a little tight in a way that might mean he’s annoyed. Harry can’t stop himself from shrinking ever-so-slightly away from him, and when Louis notices, his expression goes guilty, and he relaxes his posture, shows Harry his open palms. “Sorry, baby, I didn’t mean—I get it. It’s okay. I’m just frustrated. And I—I don’t want you to feel bad for, like, being human. That’s, like, the opposite of what I mean.” He rests his forehead on the steering wheel and groans. “Why can’t this godforsaken car go a month without breaking down?”

“It’s like forty years old, innit?”

“Yeah,” Louis says, “which apparently makes it a classic, so they can gouge you for parts.”

Harry hesitates, but eventually he asks, “Why don’t you get a new car? Or, like, a used one I suppose. New to you.”

Louis’ expression has gone tight—Harry can see that even with hair covering his face, only the profile semi-visible—and he’s taking the kind of measured breaths he does when he’s on the verge of panicking or lashing out or both, because the latter is only ever about fear, and Harry knows fear intimately. Too intimately, maybe. Louis expresses it a little differently, but Harry sees it, plain as day, both the panic and Louis’ tenacity in willing it down.

“This is my dad’s car,” Louis says, eventually, still with his head down and his face mostly covered. His hands are clenched tight, his knuckles—replete with scars thanks to Louis’ tendency to get in bar fights or punch monsters on hunts for no reason—go pale. It must hurt. Harry reaches toward him, only halfway, enough to be a question, and he lets himself exhale when Louis deliberately, slowly, looses his fingers one by one from their iron grip and reaches back. Harry was right; there are deep red marks on the palm, so he takes it gently, and, surprising himself at his own boldness, leans down to kiss it, soft.

Louis huffs a laugh that sounds a tiny bit like a sob. “It’s just,” he says, fumbling over his words, “He loved this car, y’know? His pride and joy.”

 _You should have been his pride and joy,_ Harry thinks, the thought bitter in the back of his mouth. He swallows it back down.

“And, like, a lot of my, um, my good memories with him were about the car. Cause I was always good at that. The car, I mean, fixing it and cleaning it and shit. So I never really fucked up and he told me I was a natural. God, this is stupid, I—” Louis’ free hand comes up to rub violently at his eyes, like he’s punishing them for crying. He probably is. _No,_ Harry thinks, _he definitely is._ Not for the first time, he sort of wishes he were a demon again so he could march down to Hell and rip Louis’ father’s tongue out, peel off his fingernails and break his teeth one by one. He shudders, memories starting to creep up from the depths, and shakes his head. _None of that._

“Hey,” he says, “Lou. Look at me.” Louis shakes his head. “Okay, you don’t have to, that’s fine.” He struggles for something to say. “We’re gonna fix it, okay? It’s going to be alright.” A barely there nod. “I’m going to call for a tow. Is that okay?” Another nod. Louis gets overwhelmed easily when he’s like this, especially when asked a question about what he wants or needs. Harry tries to speak to him very clearly and only ask yes or no questions, and to even keep those to a minimum, and, as uncomfortable as he feels about the idea of it, to give him directions. He thinks he’s getting better at it, learning how to navigate the terrain, so to speak. Louis hasn’t been able—or maybe just not willing, either one is likely—to explain the way getting orders calms him down sometimes when he’s so resistant to being controlled most of the time, a natural leader, but Harry has some ideas, and none of them are pleasant, so he doesn’t want to suggest them and yet wishes Louis would so he could know. He finds himself getting frustrated with Louis sometimes, with how little he tells Harry even as Harry’s laid himself more or less bare— _but that’s not fair,_ Harry reminds himself, _especially ‘cause you saw all that shit in his mind and you know how he feels about that, even though you didn’t mean to._

And it’s not as if Louis has given him nothing, nor has he forced Harry to tell him anything, just listened to everything he had to say while clearly trying to tamp down his own emotions, comforting Harry as best he can and backing off when Harry can’t be comforted, which might mean a little bit more. He’s not deciding for Harry anymore, not overriding his will. They’ve talked, at length, about the incident in Niall’s bunker, and how Harry understands but still feels violated, will maybe never feel okay about it, and Louis has nodded his head and not pleaded for forgiveness and respected Harry’s wishes in everything since, and, well. Harry can do the same in return, which means accepting that there are things Louis isn’t ready to talk about. There are plenty of things Harry’s not ready to talk about, not to anyone. Things that will stay between him and Caroline. He goes rigid at the thought of her, and feels pathetic. It’s been _months—_

“H?”

Shit, he spaced out again when he was supposed to be helping Louis calm down. “Sorry,” he says, “just thinking. Calling now.” He drops Louis’ hand, and numb, icy fingers, he scrabbles around the glove compartment for Louis’ phone, turning it on only to see the dead battery symbol. He shows it to Louis, who groans.

“Fucking dead batteries,” he mumbles. He cups his hands over his mouth to try and warm them. His fingernails are almost tinted blue; his hands and feet always get _so cold,_ and then he just shoves them between Harry’s legs or under his arms when they get in bed, burying the icy tip of his nose in Harry’s neck and grumbling if Harry protests, which he usually doesn’t. Louis can most often tell when he doesn’t want to be touched these days, and he never does it then, nor does he complain. Well. Harry takes the complaining as a sign that Louis’ feeling more like his feelings matter, even if it does get on Harry’s nerves sometimes.

“Fuck it,” Louis says, now rubbing his palms together quickly, like he’s trying to start a fire. “There’s gotta be a mechanic in town, let’s just go ask.” He gestures toward the cluster of buildings on the street a little ways behind them.

“Okay,” Harry says, “hang on a tick.”

Louis, who’s already got his door halfway open and most of his torso out into the open air, looks over his shoulder and says, “What?”

“Got to find my wellies,” Harry says, craning toward the backseat for his duffel.

“Oh for god’s sake,” he hears Louis mutter. He cringes slightly—he knows it’s not hostile, but sometimes he feels as though his skin is so thin that even a gentle breeze could rupture it—but keeps rooting, because he’s not keen on tromping through ice and snow in suede boots. Suede _Saint Laurent_ boots, which he can, unfortunately, no longer easily replace. The teleportation thing was really convenient for shoplifting; human, he’s an abysmal thief. Louis’ quite good, but Harry isn’t going to ask him to risk getting arrested for the sake of Harry’s wardrobe, even if he suspects he might be willing to do it. The thought warms him like a big gulp of tea, and he hauls the boots out of his bag, quickly making the change, and then, as an afterthought, turning back around to fetch his earmuffs, as well.

Louis rolls his eyes at him when he steps out of the car, they quickly go crinkled with his smile. “Earmuffs? Really?”

“My ears are delicate,” Harry says. “They need protection.”

Louis’ face softens a shade. “I do love your tiny little ears,” he muses (and Harry feels warm inside again, Louis applying _love_ to some part of him still sort of unbelievable). “It would be a shame if they froze off. I suppose earmuffs might be necessary.”

Harry puts on an exaggerated pout. “But what happens if I lose my earmuffs?”

“I’d ride on your shoulders and keep my hands over them,” Louis says with a laugh. “Duh. C’mon, my balls are going to freeze off.” He sees the look on Harry’s face and cackles, running a few steps away through the crunch of days-old snow. “And no, that was not an invitation to put your hands in my pants, Styles.”

“Well shit,” Harry says, following after him with long, careful strides—there’s a fair bit of ice, and he’s never had the best balance. “That really puts a wrench in my plans for the evening.” Louis doesn’t turn back around, but his laugh rings out clear and sharp.

*

Their levity is short-lived, as Harry was sure it would be. It always is—brief periods of lightness, laughter, punctuating long stretches of exhaustion, falling into holes upon holes and climbing back out of them one after one—but he always sort of hopes that it won’t be, this time. He’s pretty sure Louis thinks he’s naive for it, and he’s probably right to.

The mechanic, an older man with an accent Harry would place as Ukrainian (definitely something Slavic), had been more than a mile down the road, the snow piling up at an ever-increasing rate and making it difficult to see a foot in front of their faces. When they had arrived, shivering and sopping, it had taken close to an hour for Aleksi’s son Nikolas—who, Aleksi informed them, drove the tow truck—to arrive, another hour to tow the car, but only ten minutes for Aleksi to look under the hood and shake his head, saying it will be at least a week to get the parts in, longer if the snow keeps up. Louis argues with him, and Harry listens, although knowing next to nothing about cars, he has no idea what they’re talking about half the time, but eventually he seems to give up, face stormy and posture tight. Aleksi’s stance is defensive, and Harry frowns. _Hey,_ he wants to say, _don’t take this out on him._ But it’s too late, anyway, Louis marching back over toward the uncomfortable chair where Harry’s sitting and not-really reading an old issue of _Better Homes and Gardens,_ saying, tautly, “Fuckload of things need fixing, so we’re stuck here for a bit.”

“Okay,” Harry says. “Where are we gonna stay?”

Louis jerks his head toward where Nikolas is sitting. “His dad said he’d give us a ride to the Days Inn. Give me a hand moving the bags, would you?” Harry transfers their duffels and backpacks while Louis double-locks the trunk, making certain Aleksi isn’t going to open it, and, seeing the veritable arsenal inside, call 999. Wait, no, it’s 911 here. Do you call 911 for suspected terrorism? He’s heard the word constantly since coming to the US and he’s still fuzzy on exactly what it means, although he knows Louis is or was on the watchlist—or is it watchlists, as in multiple? At any rate, Niall’s managed, somehow, to stay off everything. Liam had said something about getting rid of their FBI records, too, and Harry’s not sure if those are connected but doesn’t want to look stupid by asking.

He can’t quite explain why he feels odd when thinking about that part of Louis’ life—him and Zayn, on the run from Liam (Liam!) and the rest of the Feds—but he guesses it has something to do with the combination of fondness and hurt that flickers across Louis’ face whenever anyone brings it up, mostly other hunters who met him back then, or even earlier, when he was hunting with his dad. Those ones make Harry wish he could still kill people by looking at them. Well. Not that he ever had, actually, and he hadn’t tried, so he likes to think he had the ability and chose not to exercise it. He’d still kill for Louis in an instant; his returned humanity hasn’t drained the evil from him like he’d foolishly hoped. But he has a life now, which doesn’t count for nothing. And he has Louis, who counts for a lot.

Once they pull into the parking lot, leaving tire tracks through the thickening coat of fresh snow, Harry digs a five dollar note out of his pocket and hands it to Nikolas before hopping down from the truck and surprising himself by keeping his balance, only sliding the tiniest bit on the slick ground. “Thank you,” he says. He hears Louis echo him on the other side of the truck, and smiles to himself. Louis’ gotten softer around the edges, lately, and it’s not that Harry’s so presumptuous as to think it’s because of him, but he does like to think Louis, maybe unconsciously, is mimicking his manners, making himself more like Harry. Which he can’t believe, since Louis is so down-to-his-core _good_ , no matter how rough his exterior might be. (Harry can’t help but feel that they’re opposites in that way, Harry’s outsides misleading, trying to disguise a core gone black with rot). It’s nice to see more of that light peeking through, now, little hints of the golden glow that had taken Harry’s breath away when he first saw it.

“What are you thinking about?” Louis asks him, often, when Harry goes quiet—not in the bad way—and just looks at Louis, really looks. He can’t exactly see his soul anymore, but there are glimpses. Harry’s answer is always to blush and duck his head, to stop staring (because as fond as the question might be, Louis gets prickly about being watched too much) and mumble, so quiet he can barely hear it himself, “Just you.”

They check in at the front desk, keeping an appropriate distance from each other while the receptionist clacks away at her keyboard. Harry picks up a few brochures from the rack. Maybe they can go hiking or something. Not likely, with how the weather’s looking, but he tucks them into his backpack anyway. He finds himself collecting little bits and bobs from the towns they stop in, with the vague idea of maybe making a scrapbook or something, someday. For now, they just pile up in one of the zippered sections of the backpack, waiting to be useful.

“Two queens,” he hears Louis say, a little defensively, when the woman asks. They’ll share one with no trouble, both of them used to smaller and less comfortable spaces, and the extra bed is helpful for when one of them (most often Harry) wakes up sweating from nightmares, skin crawling, any touch like an attack, but Harry knows that’s not the only reason, and he’s glad they don’t talk about it, that he can pretend like he’s not scared and Louis will let him. In return, he goes along with Louis pretending things don’t bother him. Sometimes. Unless it’s important. Like the car absolutely is. Harry won’t bring it up until they’ve both showered, and, provided Louis’ up for it, Harry’s sucked his dick. It’s probably manipulative, but there are worse things to be; Harry knows.

*

Once Harry’s blown him for a solid half-hour, bringing him to the edge three times during, Louis goes boneless, lying on his back with his eyes closed, looking like he might melt into the mattress and wouldn’t be too arsed about it. Harry wipes his mouth and clears his throat a couple of times before swinging his legs off the bed, waiting for the pins and needles in his feet and calves to go away, and stands to go get them some water from the tap in the bathroom. He briefly glances at his reflection in the mirror—swollen mouth, hair everywhere, flushed pink—and uses his hip to open the door back up.

Louis hasn’t moved at all. “Do I need to perform CPR?” Harry says, setting the cups down on the bedside table and sitting on the edge of the mattress, watching the shallow rise and fall of Louis’ chest, breath still coming in rapid pants. Harry feels another little spike of pride, and then immediately the thought surfaces _yeah had a lot of practice haven’t you, no wonder you’re good,_ and he’s glad he set the glasses down because he would have dropped them. He breathes deep through his nose and squeezes his eyes shut, waiting for it to pass.

Unfortunately, Louis chooses that moment to sit up and shake off his post-orgasmic haze, and Harry feels him shift on the bed, towards him. “Hey,” Louis says, voice rough. “Baby. Where are you?”

“Here,” Harry manages. The feeling is receding, a tingle of fear left behind. “Here,” he says again. “I’m fine. Drink some water.”

Louis huffs but obeys. “Happy?” he says when he’s set the drained glass back on the table.

“Yes.”

Louis smiles, soft and crooked. “Good,” he says. “You want anything?” he asks, glancing at the bulge of Harry’s semi in his jeans.

“No thanks,” Harry says, and shifts so he’s cross-legged. A few months ago he might have said _if you want,_ sensing a veiled request, but it’s a genuine question, he knows now, and it merits a genuine answer. He says _no_ maybe more often than he means, on some level aware that he’s testing Louis, pushing to see if he has a breaking point, but he always just accepts Harry’s answer and moves on. It’s taken some getting used to.

“You look like you have something to say,” Louis murmurs, moving closer again. Harry scoots toward him and turns to rest his head on Louis’ chest, arms coming up to hold him, a thumb stroking his forearm where Harry knows the binding spell used to be. They make an odd picture, Harry cross-legged with Louis’ shorter legs bracketed around him and chin hooked over his shoulder.

“How long did the shop say, again?” Harry asks.

Louis tenses a little, but he doesn’t move away or stop stroking Harry’s arm. “At least four days,” he says on an exhale, sounding defeated and something else Harry can’t quite place. “Probably longer, sorry.”

“Did he give you an estimate?”

“Two grand.”

Harry lets out a low whistle. “How—”

“I’ll figure it out,” Louis snaps, instantly going solid as a brick wall before he visibly forces himself to relax. “Sorry. It’s fine, I can do the labor myself, I’ll talk to him when the parts come in. Maybe hustle some pool. Still got money from the, uh, college fund, worse comes to worst.”

One of the many revelations since Louis reconnected with his family is that his mom and stepdad had set up a bank account, years before the fire, the sole purpose of which was to save money for Louis’ college tuition. It wasn’t very much money, but Louis had been bowled over by it anyway, crying into Harry’s neck, overwhelmed by the fact that Jay and Mark had thought he would go to college, had planned for it, saving money that could’ve gone towards a million other things but which they set aside specifically for Louis. The bank account represents a lot to him, Harry thinks. It’s tangible evidence of someone—not just someone, his _parents—_ believing in him. Harry’s seen Louis looking at online course listings a few times, Louis always immediately switching to something else as if he were looking at weird fetish porn or something. He hides his hopes for himself like they’re shameful, like he doesn’t deserve to have them. Harry understands, but he wishes Louis didn’t.

Point is, the account hasn’t been touched, and Harry suspects Louis may also have been occasionally depositing into it—again, furtively, as if he were doing something criminal. He knows what that money means to Louis.

“Is it really worth it?” Harry blurts out. “Like, how much have you spent on this car?”

Louis goes entirely rigid and stays that way. “A lot,” he says, voice tight. “It’s my money.”

“I know,” Harry says, “I’m not telling you what to do, I’m just asking.”

“It’s my dad’s car,” Louis says, as if that explains it. It does, which makes it worse.

 _Your dad’s dead, and good riddance,_ Harry thinks, but saying that isn’t going to be helpful. He’s quiet for a bit, chewing on his lip, as he tries to come up with a good response. “That’s true,” he says, “but what are _you_ getting out of it?”

“I don’t want to talk about this,” Louis says, his tone decisive and final. He unwraps himself from around Harry and stands up, picking up his discarded jeans and pulling them on, then cursing as he searches for his shoes. One of them’s under the bed, Harry knows, but he’s feeling quite stroppy now and doesn’t say anything or move to help him.

“I’m gonna go to the snack machine,” Louis says. “You want anything?” Harry softens somewhat. He knows it’s Louis saying, _sorry, I just need some space,_ and he can’t exactly get mad at him for that.

“Twix if they have it,” he says.

“What self-respecting vending machine doesn’t have Twix?” Louis scoffs. He pauses halfway out the door as if he has something else to say, lingering for just a moment. “Love you,” he says, and goes. Harry smiles.

*

It’s been more than five minutes and Louis isn’t back. The vending machine is just down the hallway, and whilst Louis can be quite particular about his snack foods, he really should be back by now. Harry bites his lip. Louis hates it when people worry about him. But what if he slipped and fell? What if an icicle broke off the gutter and knocked him out? _What if,_ a cold voice says, _someone hurt him and it’s your fault because you didn’t look out for him?_

Harry stands immediately and shoves his boots on, can’t get his heel all the way down on the left but doesn’t bother with it, limping slightly as he hurries toward the door and down the hallway. He hears a voice. He doesn’t think it belongs to Louis. _Please be okay please be okay please be okay._

He rounds the corner. Louis is there, alive and unharmed, but his stance is alarming; he’s got his back against the wall and his arms crossed, and he doesn’t acknowledge Harry even though Harry knows Louis is hyperaware of his surroundings—it’s one of his biggest assets on hunts—and so must have noticed Harry’s arrival.

And so Harry follows his gaze to the opposite wall, where there’s a man with a beautiful face and fine features that might take Harry’s breath away under different circumstances, long dark eyelashes and a beard he wears well, unlit cigarette held casually between two fingers, thin and reedy and yet standing as if he isn’t.

Harry may speak slowly and space out and sometimes he doesn’t make sense to anyone else, but he isn’t thick. There’s only one person this could be, and Harry sees red.

“Hi,” the man says, sticking out a tattooed hand. “I’m Zayn.”

“I know,” Harry snaps, a little taken aback by how much venom actually comes out. “I’ve heard about you.”

Zayn smiles. “Yeah, Louis must’ve mentioned?” Louis nods, face gone tight and blank, pale like he’s lost too much blood. He seems to remember he has a body and moves himself into a more natural posture, although still blatantly on the defensive. Harry can see the fight in his face between puffing himself up and making himself as small as he can be, and he hates anyone who puts that look there. Most of the ones who are responsible for it are gone, now, beyond his reach, but not this one.

He takes a deep breath. Sometimes it feels like all that happened was that the demonic part of him got beaten down and locked away, now snarling and throwing itself against the bars, a creature he has to be vigilant about keeping captive and controlled. Rationally, he sort of knows it’s not true—he’s lost control of himself enough times and remained entirely human, has splashed himself with holy water expecting a burn, maybe even hoping for it—but anger, the murderous kind simmering under his skin now, isn’t a feeling he knows what to do with as a human. He asked Louis, a while ago, and he just gave a mirthless laugh and said, “Either kill something, start a fight, or drink until I pass out. Sometimes all of the above,” in that tight, higher-pitched tone that means he really doesn’t want to talk about it. So Harry backed off.

He blinks, realizing he’d spaced out again, and Louis is now looking at him, a little crease in his brow, mouth drawn tight. His eyes are wild and shiny. _Shit._ Louis has a hard time with saying _I need you,_ but he does it with his face without even realizing he is.

“Who’s this, then?” Zayn says, breaking their eye contact.

“Um,” Louis says. He coughs into his fist twice. “This is Harry. My, um, my…partner.”

“Ah.” Zayn’s eyebrows lift higher. “Hunting partner or partner-partner?”

“Both,” Harry says, immediately, needing suddenly and desperately to assert his position, his claim to Louis, and then winces. He feels reckless and vicious, not unlike the way he used to, and it’s making him dangerous.

“Both,” Louis repeats, quietly. Harry takes his hand when he reaches out, squeezing hard, and he takes deep breaths to calm himself.

“Well, that’s good,” Zayn says, awkwardly. “Never thought I’d see the day, Tommo.”

Harry sees it for what it is: Zayn leveraging his history with Louis, making sure Harry knows that he’s known him for longer and that Louis’ not the long-term type. Or maybe Harry’s just projecting. Still. He shifts closer to Louis and resists the urge to pick him up or something. The possessive feelings aren’t new, but they’ve never been this intense, and have also mostly been completely irrational, in hindsight.

“Never thought I’d see you again,” Louis says.

“Nah, I figured we’d run into each other at some point,” Zayn says. “Small world, eh?”

“It is,” Louis agrees. “What brings you to town?”

“Same as you,” Zayn says, raising an eyebrow. He looks around. “You really wanna have this conversation out here?”

“Yeah,” Harry says. He doesn’t want to have this conversation at all.

Louis ignores him. “You got a room?”

Zayn tilts his head. “Down the hall.”

“Lou—” Harry starts.

“H,” Louis snaps, “you can go back to our room if you want.”

It hits as a sharp twinge, punching an involuntary noise out of him. Louis’ face softens and quickly goes guilty, but his mouth stays shut. He doesn’t want to show weakness in front of Zayn, Harry figures, and he understands, and knows he’s being sort of unreasonable, but it smarts all the same.

“Nah, I’ll come with,” Harry says, trying to keep his voice steady. He does okay.

Zayn’s eyebrows climb even higher. “If you say so,” he says, with a half-laugh that sounds more than a little disparaging.

“Zayn,” Louis says, even sharper, “watch it.”

Zayn snorts. “Jesus, alright then. Calm down.”

And Harry wants to snap _you don’t have the right to tell him to calm down,_ yell that the problem is that Louis makes himself calm down over things that hurt him, but Louis is saying _please_ with his eyes, and so Harry swallows it down and only drags his feet a little on the way to Zayn’s room.

*

“So there’s a case here?”

“Looks like,” Zayn says, shuffling a bunch of papers around on the tiny motel desk, maps and articles and photographs. “I’m not sure what else to make of these, er, ‘accidents’. Like, okay, one dude sticking his head in the oven, could be nothing. But this one put his own hand in a blender—both, actually. One, then the other. I think he’s in the psych ward. And the third one fucking…Christ.” Zayn shudders, putting a hand over his mouth. “Who the fuck chops their own dick off with garden shears?” He shakes his head, closing his eyes. “All three within the last week, with no apparent connection between the victims. Houses showed no signs of break-in. Haven’t gotten my hands on anyone’s hospital records, yet.”

“Which you think will show…?”

“I don’t know,” Zayn says. “An explanation for why they did it? These don’t seem like suicide attempts.”

“You never know,” Louis murmurs. “People do some jacked up shit.”

“Maybe the oven. The other two…”

“Could just be wackos,” Louis says, but it’s half-hearted, and Harry knows he’s just saying it for the sake of argument, that he’s already agreed that there’s a case here. The fact that he’s still talking to Zayn says enough.

“I’m thinking witches. Demon, maybe.”

Harry tenses, but Louis doesn’t look toward him, leaning over the table with Zayn, his brow furrowed. “This has witch written all over it.”

“I checked out the scenes. Couldn’t find any hex bags.”

“You’re shitty at finding hex bags.”

“Hey!”

Louis laughs, sudden and loud. Harry jumps a little. “I’m right,” he says. “You really do suck.”

There’s a developing ease between them, and Harry watches silently, noting the gradual loosening of Louis’ body language, the growing expressiveness of his face. He might not be conscious of it, but Harry notices, and he doesn’t like it. Sure, he can’t see souls anymore, but he that doesn’t mean he doesn’t have instincts about people. And besides, he knows how broken up Louis still is about what happened between them, even if he doesn’t know exactly what happened—he’s pushed up against the edges enough that he knows the shape of it, this walled-off part of Louis that’s appearing before his eyes.

“I could use some help,” Zayn says, carefully. “How long are y’all here?”

“Few days,” Louis says. “Car trouble.”

“Are you still driving that damn thing?”

“Yeah,” Louis says, gone a little quieter. “Talk about it in the morning, yeah?”

“That means yes?”

A tense, humming silence, and then an exhale. “Yeah, may as well. See you tomorrow.”

“Nice to meet you, Harry,” Zayn says as they’re on their way out the door. Once it’s closed, Louis crumples—not dramatically, just as though half the air has been let out of him and he’s trying to move around on deflated limbs, and Harry’s grateful that for once his clumsiness abates long enough that he can catch Louis under the arm and hold him up, walking them back to the room with Louis’ face buried in his neck, breathing heavily.

He gets it under control before they even reach the door, ducking out from Harry’s hold and standing up straight, visibly composing himself. Sometimes Harry wishes he didn’t try to pretend he was okay around him, but he does the same thing, and there’s something special to getting to watch the way he picks himself up, dusts himself off, and keeps going, too. Louis heads straight for the shower and comes out ten minutes later, pink and raw like he ran it too hot, like he does sometimes, drying his hair with a towel, tee and boxers already on. Harry scoots to the side so he has ample room to get in bed, and he lets out a sigh of relief when he feels Louis’ weight depressing the mattress, then hears the _click_ of the lamp going out.

“You okay?” Harry whispers, once the lights are off and they’re under the duvet facing each other, the vague outlines of their figures visible in the darkness. It’s like looking at Louis is more special, this way, when he has to try harder to make out his features, his favorite ones, the sweep of his eyelashes and the shape of his nose. Louis says he looks like a serial killer when he stares like this, but he doesn’t tell him to stop, so Harry doesn’t.

He reaches out to brush a piece of hair out of Louis’ face. His fringe is getting long, long enough that the front piece can tuck behind his ear, so Harry does, and breath hitches when Louis turns his face to kiss Harry’s palm. “I’m okay,” he says into Harry’s hand. “Just didn’t expect to see him.”

“Hmmm.”

“Which is kinda stupid, since, like, hunting is a small world. Maybe I should be surprised I hadn’t run into him before now. It just—I don’t really have a choice about it, that’s the part that gets to me.”

“Makes sense,” Harry says, thumb brushing along Louis’ cheekbone and the fine baby hairs next to his ear. “‘M sorry.”

“Not your fault,” Louis says. “Feels like I can’t catch a fucking break, though.” His voice cracks and wobbles at the end of the sentence before going altogether silent.

“Lou,” Harry says, shuffling closer so he can bring his other hand up and stroke Louis’ hair in an attempt to soothe him. “Love.” He feels something wet hit his palm.

“He left,” Louis whispers.

“I know.”

“He left. He can’t just come back like nothing happened.”

“Mmm.”

“I just,” Louis says, “I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to do this. There’s got to be a right choice but I can’t figure out what the fuck it is.”

“Me neither,” Harry says, kissing Louis’ neck. “You’ll figure it out.”

“Yeah,” Louis says, and Harry wishes he sounded like he believed it.

Louis, for once, falls asleep first—unless he’s gotten better at faking it all of a sudden—and Harry stares at the ceiling, watching the indistinct shadows of falling snow in the faint, flickering light from the streetlamp outside.

Sometimes—often—Harry wonders what Louis sees in him, and in his darker moments he starts to fear that maybe he’s a project, one that Louis will eventually tire of, or else (possibly worse) that Louis just feels sorry for him, keeping him around out of pity and secretly horrified by all the things Harry’s done and been, which he barely knows a quarter of, if that. Harry mentioned this to Nick, once, who immediately sat straight up and said, seriously, “Harry. I have known him longer than any of you. Trust me, he’s not that good a person, and he’s, like, constitutionally incapable of pretending to like someone he doesn’t.” And Harry rationally knows Nick has no reason to lie to him, and that he has a point—Louis really is terrible at concealing his distaste for people—and that Harry’s probably just being mental, but. He thinks of the car, of the busted-up journal with its spiral binding falling off and its pages having to be held in place with two rubber bands, and he wonders, if Louis were tired of him, if he would even realize it himself.

*

In the morning, the light is almost offensively white, and Harry squints, stumbling over to pull the curtain all the way closed, and when his eyes adjust to the light he sees that the snow’s almost all the way up to the window, completely obscuring the street and sidewalk outside.

Harry’s fascinated by snow; there was never much when he was growing up—and if there was, it was melted by noon—and he stuck mostly to West Coast crossroads, where snow sent everyone apoplectic and wasn’t deep enough to make snow angels (or demons, he supposes) in.

Louis groans when he wakes up and sees it. “Fuck,” he says. “We’re fucking snowed in, aren’t we.”

“Dunno,” Harry says. “Looks like quite a lot.”

Louis’ hand hovers in front of the heater built into the wall, and he sighs. “Still got power,” he says. “Thank fucking god.”

They’re both quiet for a while. “So,” Harry says eventually.

“So,” Louis echoes. “I should…I mean, yeah, I should go check on what Zayn’s doing. About the case.”

“Oh,” Harry says, mouth dry. “You want…should I stay here?”

“No!” Louis hurries. “I mean, sorry, I didn’t mean to phrase that like I didn’t want you, you just. You don’t seem to like Zayn very much.”

“Wonder why,” Harry mutters under his breath.

Louis sighs, irritated. “You can’t…I mean, whatever. Think what you like about him. But I don’t need this to be harder than it already is. We’re stuck here, and there’s people who need help, so it’s…whatever. It doesn’t matter.”

“Sorry.” Harry feels his face flush with shame, and ducks his head to let his hair fall in front and hide it. There’s no real point, because Louis knows him, and knows that this is what Harry does when he’s trying not to cry, but he doesn’t want him to see his face.

He hears Louis sigh. “I’m sorry, baby.” He moves closer—Harry watches his feet shuffle, and then there’s a gentle hand under his chin, guiding it upwards. Reluctantly, Harry meets his eyes. Louis looks tired. “Didn’t mean to snap at you. Just…”

“I know,” Harry says. “It’s fine, sorry. I’ll be civil.” He schools his face into a small smile.

Louis returns it, although it doesn’t reach his eyes. “There’s my charmer. C’mon, I need coffee.”

*

“We’re sure the victims aren’t connected?” Louis asks, shifting in his seat and making the booth squeak as he works on cutting up more of his (apparently very tough) sausage links. The sound of cutlery scraping against plates makes Harry vaguely nervous and irritated, but he's not sure why.

At any rate, there’s too much going on around him, and he’s grateful—well, trying to be—that Louis had requested a booth and given Harry the seat by the window, and more importantly, a corner to press himself into. Sometimes when it’s he and Louis they get booths and both do this, so. Harry’s not entirely sure what to read into Louis having set them up like this—Harry in the corner and he on the end, with Zayn across from them, more or less in line with Louis—and he’s not sure he should read anything, because that’s a bad habit of his. He picks at his granola and fruit, wishing he’d gone for pancakes or something else sickly sweet and not given into the illogical impulse to eat something _healthy and mature_ in front of Zayn, which he’s not going to unpack, not sure he could. He stabs a grape with his fork and accidentally sends it flying across the table, hitting Zayn in the eye.

There’s silence for a moment, and then Louis starts laughing, loudly enough that the few other people in the diner turn to _shh_ him, but Louis has his eyes closed and is bent forward over the table, trying to get himself under control.

“He’s always been like this,” Zayn says. Harry snaps his gaze up to look at him, but can’t read his expression, can’t tell if this is a peace offering or a jibe, a reminder of how long Zayn’s known Louis, their shared history. “He put his gum in my hair once and the only reason I didn’t immediately strangle him was that I was pretty sure he was going to asphyxiate himself from laughing anyway.”

“I got it out!” Louis wheezes, slowing his breathing. He wipes tears from his eyes. “Remember, I went and snatched all those little single-serve peanut butter things at the breakfast bar.”

“I do,” says Zayn, with a small smile. “And then you ran into the housekeeping lady on the way back and she asked if you wanted some jelly to go with all that.”

It’s…Harry’s not sure of the word for it. Jocular? Nostalgic? Bitter? Wistful? All at once—is there a word for that? Or is Harry just reading too much into it? No, he decides. His instincts—duller than they once were, in many ways, but sharper in others—say the prickling energy surrounding them is strange, is some bizarre mixture of emotions bouncing off one another, sparking as they collide.

Or Harry’s reading too much into it. He turns back to his plate, takes a sip of tea, and has a bite of pineapple. It’s almost inedible, so tough and unripe it takes real work to chew and swallow, leaving his jaw aching. He’s so much more sensitive to tastes and smells, now, and it’s a bit inconvenient. (And sometimes a bit amazing, like when he discovered Dunkin’ Donuts). After a thoroughly unsatisfying piece of cantaloupe, he sighs and nudges his plate away, resigned to being hungry all morning.

Without a word, Louis pushes his own plate to the right, so it’s in between them, and he gives Harry a wink and a nod toward it that says _go on._ Harry smiles, feeling his cheeks flush. Louis doesn’t share food, but he shares with Harry. He picks up a bit of bacon and starts munching on it.

After he’s swallowed, he realizes the atmosphere’s shifted again, and when he looks up, he sees Zayn staring at him, then at Louis, then back at him. _What,_ he almost snaps, but remembers he’d promised Louis he’d be civil, so he settles for a mid-level glare, and then Louis snaps, “What?” and Harry feels himself smile, instead. _Little fireball,_ he thinks, and knows to keep it to himself. He presses his thumb against Louis’ thigh under the table, the knuckles of his closed fist.

“Nothing,” Zayn says, palms immediately going up in mock defense. It’s, like, the third time he’s done it, and Harry despises it. “Sheesh, sensitive.” Louis rolls his eyes. “Literally all I was thinking is that you used to threaten to castrate me if I stole one of your fries.”

“I still would,” Louis says, dark and low.

“You’ve got him all soft,” Zayn says to Harry.

“New subject,” Louis interrupts. His voice is edged. “Can we talk about the goddamn case?”

“Alright,” Zayn says, again in that tone that reeks _I think you’re being unreasonable so I’m going to act overly accommodating to say that without saying it._ “Connection between the victims isn’t immediately apparent, but that doesn’t mean it’s not there. ‘M gonna go to the library.”

“Just you?”

Zayn shrugs. “Unless you’ve also developed an actual interest in research, too?”

“No,” Louis says, quietly, and if Harry weren’t so attuned to him, he might not notice the slight change in his posture, shrinking just minutely.

Louis is reluctant to admit he’s brilliant, is the thing. Actually, Harry’s pretty sure he doesn’t believe it at all, constantly attributing his successes and insights to other people or to sheer dumb luck. Harry knows he’s upset about having dropped out of high school, despite that not having been his fault; his father basically made it impossible for him to finish, what with the constant moving and the amount of responsibility he expected Louis to shoulder, and Louis’ determination to bear that and more. Louis says he was bad at school anyway, and Harry doesn’t doubt that—Louis is quick and spastic and smart-mouthed and the opposite of everything teachers usually reward—but he doesn’t agree with Louis’ implicit conclusion that that makes him not-smart, and he tenses when Louis offhandedly calls himself a dumbass. It’s another one of those things they don’t really talk about.

Harry can see, now, another little bit of where that might come from, as well. Zayn’s the kind of quiet, reserved booksmart, scanning through newspapers and archives with his brow furrowed and putting pieces together alarmingly quickly, and if Louis was comparing himself, Harry knows he’d look at it and find himself lacking. Not because he is, but because he’s hard-wired to see only his failures. It’s frustrating, to say the least. Heartbreaking.

It’s a good thing Zayn excuses himself, then, tossing a couple of notes on the table, because the creature—maybe not a demon, but certainly demonic—that lives inside Harry (that _is_ him, is what he became), locked in a cage too small for it, limbs sticking out through the bars, begins to gnash its many mouths, howling and screeching, rattling against the iron, threatening to break.

*

Harry hates pretending to be a cop, but Louis had said the only other option was to pose as a priest, so he does his best to look presentable, scrapes his hair back into a bun and shoves a hat on over it, thankful for the cold weather, although once they get inside the first house, with the heat cranked all the way up, he begins to sweat profusely.

“Does your husband have any enemies?” Louis asks, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, his hands clasped in the middle, almost like he’s praying.

“No,” the woman—Esther—says quietly, arms and legs crossed and eyes on the floor.

“No one?” Louis presses. “No pissed-off neighbors, co-workers? Anyone who might have a key to the house? Anyone he might owe something to?”

“ _No,_ ” she insists, looking up with watery and angry eyes. “And I’ve already given a statement and I wasn’t here and if you want to know you should ask him, alright?” Alan, who had mangled both his hands in a Vitamix, is on suicide watch, and therefore unable to have visitors—they’d checked.

“What do you think happened?” Louis’ being significantly more brusque than he normally is when talking to victims’ families, and he can’t seem to sit still, continuously shifting in his seat and messing with his nails and strands of his hair and the hem of his jacket.

“I don’t know,” Esther says. “I don’t—maybe he just lost it, I don’t know.”

Louis leans forward a little more. “Does he lose it frequently?”

“No,” she says, immediately, with a little too much force. Harry catches Louis’ eye, sees his own thought reflected back at him. “I don’t know why he would do something like this.”

“That’s what we’re trying to find out,” Harry croaks out, trying his best to be reassuring. “Are you alright?”

She shrugs, the movement making her even smaller. “It’s all just a shock.”

Louis asks her something else, and Harry tunes it out, looking around the living room. It’s mostly unremarkable, at first glance, but as he looks more closely, he notices long, rough-looking scuff marks on the wood floors, one of them ending just by the chair where he’s sitting. The china cabinet on the back wall has several gaps on its shelves, two dessert plates where there are four dinner ones. The rug in the center of the room is a little rumpled, slipped partially off its rubber mat. And there’s a feeling, an electricity that stands the hairs at the back of Harry’s neck on end, and he doesn’t like it. He wants to go.

Esther seems to want them to go, too, and he touches Louis’ arm to stop him from asking another question. Louis looks at him for a moment, and then nods on an exhale.

“Here’s my card,” Louis tells Esther, pulling one from his wallet. My cell phone’s on there. If there’s anything we can do…”

She gives a tight smile and walks towards the door, holding it open with a clear message. “Thanks, officers, but I’m fine. Take care.”

As they trudge the mile and a half back to the motel, Louis appears deep in thought. Halfway there, he takes his phone out of his pocket and makes a call.

“You found anything?” he says into the receiver. So it’s Zayn, then. “Okay, screw the dude’s hospital records. Any arrests?” A pause. “Alright. That’s not too useful. Any chance you could get ahold of the wife’s files? Esther Weis. W-E-I-S, yeah. Kay. Thanks.” He snaps the phone shut.

“What did he say?” Harry asks.

Louis sighs, his breath white and almost opaque. “One DUI, six years ago. And there’s a sealed record from, like, four years before that, probably a divorce. But. Um.”

“Yeah,” Harry agrees. He catches Louis’ eye to make sure he understands that Harry knows what he’s saying, that Harry noticed, too. The small look of gratitude on Louis’ weary, raw face goes some way to stilling the anxiety building in Harry’s gut. They keep walking.

*

The thing is, Harry realizes, growing heavier and more nauseous by the minute, is that Esther isn’t an anomaly. All the women—and they are all women, all partners of the _victims_ , although calling them that is starting to make something deep in Harry squirm and protest—are quiet, a little skittish, or else overly talkative, performatively happy, but none of them seem to want to get close to either Harry or Louis, and there’s something in the way air fills up these rooms that sets Harry’s teeth on edge, and he just _knows_ , in the way he can’t explain.

Louis does, too, from the looks of it, going quieter and quieter with his mouth in a tighter and tighter line, his steps a little more tired, a little heavier, with each one.

By the time they make it back to the motel, it’s been dark for hours, and Zayn’s at the front door, smoking a cigarette and leaning against the wall, head tipped back and smoke rising lazily from his mouth every so often. Louis does the same thing sometimes, and Harry feels like he’s boiling, again, just for a moment, watching the familiar motion carried out by an unfamiliar body, an unfamiliar person, a motion he’d known as Louis and only Louis, and now seems borrowed, different. Not his, a reminder of how much he doesn’t know about Louis, about what built him into the person he is now.

 _It’s a fucking cigarette,_ he scolds himself. _There are only so many ways to smoke them._ Besides, he doesn’t even like that Louis smokes, so he shouldn’t care.

“Finally,” Zayn says, flicking ash onto the pavement. “Was beginning to think you’d gotten yourself into trouble.”

“Who, me?” Louis says dryly. “I’ve never gotten myself into trouble once in my entire life.”

“How’d it go?”

“Good,” Louis says, sharp and short. “Debrief in the morning, yeah?”

Zayn shrugs and takes a long inhale. “Suit yourself,” he says. “See ya.”

*

Louis heads straight for the shower once they’re in the room, leaving the door open in what’s presumably an invitation for Harry to join him (still, Harry’s overly loud in coming in and undressing, so as to give Louis plenty of warning if he _doesn’t_ want Harry there). They stand together under the spray and don’t say much of anything, just sort of rocking back and forth. It’s nice. Intimate. Soft. In his more sappy moments, Harry thinks about how lovely it is to just _be_ together, without the intent of getting off or even particularly of getting clean. Just slippery skin and hot water and the two of them.

He likes, too, how Louis will touch him all over, again without intent, like he’s just feeling him, wanting to confirm he’s there. He’ll rub over the mess of scarring that makes up Harry’s abdomen now, which Harry can’t believe he doesn’t think is ugly but is nevertheless greedy to hear Louis say so with his hands and his words.

When they’ve been in the water long enough that their fingers and toes have gone wrinkly, Louis shuts off the shower and hands them both towels from the rack on the wall, including one for Harry’s customary towel-turban, which Louis beams at.

They slip into bed, under well-starched linens, and are quiet for a few heavy moments.

“So,” Louis says.

“Did you…” Harry begins, and trails off, the question stuck in his throat.

“Yeah,” Louis sighs, “I thought the same thing. Think Zayn’ll confirm it in the morning, but…”

“Mhm,” Harry murmurs. He reaches out and lays his palm flat on the duvet between them, the fabric cool and undisturbed. It takes a minute, but Louis’ hand joins him, his pinky just barely touching Harry’s last knuckle. It’s like he feels every nerve ending individually, raw and sensitive the way he gets sometimes.

“You think so too?” Louis asks.

“Yeah,” Harry says, doesn’t ask for clarification. He feels like there are a thousand questions within the one Louis asked, and he’s not quite sure how to answer any of them. “I do.”

“It’s just—” A note of frustration ekes into Louis’ voice. “It feels…complicated. Not just this. But everything. I mean, it’s supposed to be simple. Saving people, hunting things,” he says with a little waver.

Harry’s breath hitches; it’s confirmation that they’re talking about what he thought they were talking about, one of the things Harry heard when he possessed Louis, repeated like a prayer, a mantra, clung to and feared at once. And here he is, again, Louis’ birth father on the bed between them, invisible and silent and terrifying.

The silence stretches on, and Harry knows he has to say something, lest Louis mistake his hesitance for hostility. “I think,” he says, slowly, “it’s…maybe always been complicated. And as you…grow, or something, you just see it more.”

Louis snorts. “Poetic.”

It stings just slightly, but Harry shakes it off. “I just mean that complicated isn’t bad. ‘S just how things are, sometimes. A lot of the time. Like, I’m…complicated, you know?”

“Are you?” Louis mocks, then going soft and quiet. “I mean, yeah, but…I don’t know. You just felt right. Feel right.”

Harry smiles a little. “Thanks, love.”

Louis flicks the back of his hand. “You know what I mean.”

“I do,” Harry agrees.

“Do you think…like, does anyone really deserve to die?”

 _There it is_. “I think,” Harry says, “that death seems like it’s simple, but I don’t know that there’s, like…I don’t think it’s good or bad, or right or wrong, necessarily. It just is.”

“Is what it is,” Louis murmurs.

“Exactly,” Harry says, tracing where he knows the lines of Louis’ chest piece are.

“But you…” Louis coughs. “When…you’ve made that call, though, who dies and who doesn’t.”

Harry’s throat tightens. “I didn’t want to.”

“I know,” Louis rushes, “god, I didn’t mean…I know you didn’t want to, but you chose, like, who you’d deal with, and who you’d try to save. And it totally makes sense and I don’t disagree, like, obviously I think it was right of you to save kids from Hell, but that’s an extreme, y’know?”

“Yeah,” Harry says. “That’s a simpler one.”

“Not everyone goes to Hell, though.”

Harry shakes his head. He knows Louis is watching him closely in the dark, can feel the weight of his scrutiny. “No, not everyone.”

“But for the people who do, death is…it’s gotta be bad.”

“Yeah,” Harry agrees. “But sometimes it’s good for the people who are alive. Who maybe needed to be protected.”

“How do you judge that?” Louis snaps, the kind of irritated that means he’s close to tears.

“I don’t know,” Harry answers honestly. “I can’t…” He wants to say _your father deserved what he got_ but Louis wouldn’t take it well, and Harry knows that his own emotions are making that judgment, not any kind of abstract ethics. He thinks _you deserved to be protected_. He says, “You protected me.”

“I did,” Louis says, after a beat.

Harry’s mouth is dry. “Do you…d’you regret that?”

“ _No_ ,” Louis chokes, and the next thing Harry knows, he’s hovering above him, eyes bright and reflective in the spare light of the room. “God, baby, no,” he says. Harry holds back a flinch. _He won’t hurt you,_ he tells himself. _You won’t hurt him. It’s okay. This is okay._ Louis’ hand cups his jaw, and he leans down, pressing their foreheads together. Louis’ breaths are ragged and a little sour with the ghost of whiskey drunk a while ago. He’s so close, closing Harry in like this, and he feels his own heart rate pick up, his breaths becoming shallower; the moment he does, Louis rolls off to the side and grips Harry’s hands in his, says, “I’m sorry,” kisses his knuckles.

“‘S okay,” Harry whispers, and cranes to kiss the scruff of his cheek.

“I could never regret you,” Louis says, clear and firm. “Nothing could make me.”

A lump rises in Harry’s throat, and he hates the shake of his voice when he speaks. “Hope you’re right.” He thinks of all the people who are hurt or dead or worse, all of them direct casualties of Harry’s actions, by his own hands or others’, people he gave weapons and let loose to do what they would with them. It’s not any better, is it?

“I know I am,” Louis says. “That’s my one sure thing.” He kisses Harry’s shoulder, soft and dry, and settles in to sleep, the sheets warming beneath him.

*

“You find anything useful?” Louis asks when they meet Zayn for breakfast.

“Not a whole hell of a lot,” Zayn says. “No real criminal records, except the first one, Alan, with the DUI. Bill…um, Zimmerman, cops have come over a couple times about noise complaints, but nothing further.”

“Mary’s husband?”

“They’re not married, as far as I can tell.”

“What kind of noise complaints?”

“Why, you find something?”

“They don’t seem like party people,” Louis says. “You sure the noise complaint wasn’t about domestic dispute?”

“If it was, it doesn’t say so here. Everything seemed normal when police arrived, apparently. Mary said they were watching a movie and had the volume turned up too loud. New sound system, apparently.”

Louis sighs; so does Harry.

“What?”

“There wasn’t a sound system in that house,” Louis says. “How long ago was this?”

“Three months.” Zayn suddenly startles, looking out the window as though he’s seen a ghost. Or something else, since Zayn is probably used to seeing ghosts, like the rest of them.

“What?” Louis says, turning around to follow his gaze. “You see something?”

“Nothing,” Zayn says, still staring out the window. “It’s—nevermind, thought I saw…anyway. So no sound system, she lied about that. You think she did it?”

“I don’t know,” Louis says, with a heavy sigh. He picks at his fingernails. “Does seem like witchcraft, though.”

“I hate witches,” Zayn mutters, slapping his hand down on the table. Harry flinches, and his cheeks instantly flame with embarrassment. He hopes Zayn didn’t notice, but when he chances a glance up, he’s met with a level, shrewd gaze that holds his for a second before moving back to Louis. “Crafty bitches.”

“Hey,” Louis says, sharply. Harry half-smiles.

“Sorry. So, what, all the wives are witches? You think they were cheating, or what?”

“Or what,” Harry mumbles, unable to help himself.

“What?” Zayn says sharply. “Care to repeat that?”

Louis’ hand settles on Harry’s knee, but he jerks away from it, suddenly angry in the way that would’ve made his eyes flash scarlet, before. “I said _or what_ ,” he says, keeping his voice level with some effort.

“Haz,” Louis cuts in, warning, and then he turns to Zayn. “Guarantee you all of them have gotten violent at some point. Pretty often, I’d wager.”

Zayn raises his eyebrows. “Based on?”

“Not being an idiot,” Harry mutters under his breath.

Louis sighs. “It makes sense.”

Zayn looks hard at him for a moment, and then nods. “Okay. Still seems like witchcraft.”

“The houses were clean,” Louis says. “No hex bags, no grimoires, no nothing.”

“Which could just mean they covered their tracks,” Zayn argues. “They’d actually be kinda stupid not to.”

Louis opens his mouth, but the sound he makes is drowned out abruptly by the wail of a siren and the staccato flashing of the ambulance streaking past them.

*

The call had come from just a few blocks over, and when they arrive at the scene, all the first responders have already cleared out. Frank’s in the hospital, with, according to Zayn, every single bone in his body broken, including the ones in his inner ears. His wife, Grace, is at home, and more than a little distraught when they show up at her door asking about the circumstances of her husband’s self-immolation.

“I don’t know,” she says. “I didn’t—I wouldn’t—”

Louis cuts in, “Did you talk to anyone? Was anyone asking about your husband? Anyone who might have had reason to hurt him?”

She stares at him. “He set himself on fire.”

“Yes,” Zayn says. “We’re looking into that.”

“I don’t know why,” she insists. “And no, he didn’t have any enemies. He’s a fucking town commissioner, for god’s sake. He chaperones field trips and coaches the soccer team.”

“Were there problems in the marriage?”

She’s quiet for a moment. “All marriages have problems,” she says softly.

“That’s true,” Louis says. “Was he ever violent? Did he ever threaten to hurt you, or himself?”

“I mean, he said things,” she whispers. “And—I mean, I don’t know, I was worried he might do _something_ but…not this.”

“Something like?”

“He would…nevermind, it doesn’t matter—”

“Everything matters.”

“He—I mean, sometimes, when we were fighting, he’d…he’d never get it _out_ , but there is, y’know, he has a rifle. He hunts, sometimes, when his dad’s in town.”

“He threatened to shoot you?”

She shakes her head. “Himself.”

“So he was suicidal?” Zayn asks.

Louis shushes him. “Are you sure he never threatened _you_?”

She shrugs weakly. “I mean,” she says, voice high, “he never, like, pointed it at me, or…it’s stupid, I upset him, I would provoke him—”

“Did you ever try to leave him?”

She shakes her head. “I…I was worried. About him. He’s just…he had a horrible childhood, okay? His mom abandoned him, and his dad beat the shit out of him, and he just…he never told anyone, not until me. So I couldn’t leave him.”

“Did he tell you you couldn’t leave him?”

“No,” she says, but she’d hesitated.

“When he’d threaten to hurt himself, was it in retaliation for anything? Such as you attempting to leave the relationship, or express unhappiness?”

She’s crying, now. “Look, I—I know, alright? I’m not s-stupid. Like, the week before, I was on this domestic violence helpline thing…I was trying to figure out how to leave. But I didn’t think he would do something like that.”

“Did you give your information to anyone in this chatroom?” Zayn asks.

“Just my name and the town. My first name. And his.” She shakes her head. “Nothing dangerous.”

“I believe you, Louis says gently. “Okay? We don’t think you did anything wrong. And it’s good, that you were talking to people and asking for help. Is there anywhere you can go, someone you can stay with?”

She shakes her head. “I don’t know. Maybe. I mean, there’s my mom, but I don’t know—”

“Where she is?”

“If she’d want me back,” says. “I fought with her right before I left. About Frank. She never liked him.”

“Worth a shot,” Louis says. “Just give her a call, would you? I bet she’d like to see you.”

Grace eventually relents and packs a suitcase, which she puts in the backseat of her blue station wagon and drives away with.

They wait until nightfall to search the house, which leaves several hours for Harry to do little but watch silently as Louis and Zayn make conversation conducted in half-sentences they both seem to understand, he realizes that this is what Louis looks like trying to fix things, whether he’s consciously aware of it or not, and it hits him with cold terror that if he fixes this, he might not even be interested in the project of Harry anymore, that repairing this fractured relationship might be what he really wants. _Stop it,_ he tells himself. _Louis isn’t like that._ The fear is stubborn, though, and coils around him tighter as he tries to reason with it.

The thing, Harry has gathered, is that Louis hasn’t managed to let go of the _you and me against the world_ mentality that his father instilled—violently—in him. You could trust one person, and one person only: your partner. So when Zayn walked out, Louis maybe even more acutely felt his father’s absence.

It’s not even that Louis is angry at Zayn, although he is. It’s not just the hurt, either. It’s that Zayn is the first person—in his memory—to leave him, not by accident or circumstance, but by choice, and Louis obsesses, Harry suspects, over exactly what made him make that choice, what Louis had done or what Louis was that he could’ve changed, could change now.

The sun goes down around 4:30, and soon enough the blanket of night is thick enough to conceal the three of them moving through it. The breaking-and-entering part is old hat by this point, and they’re through the backdoor in less than a minute.

“Okay,” Louis whispers. “Spread out, we’re trying to cover—”

“Oi! You there!” It’s a woman’s voice, he’s reasonably sure, and not one he recognizes.

“Fuck,” Harry yelps, freezing on the spot. “Fuck fuck fuck.”

“Shit!” Louis fumbles for his flashlight and it falls to the ground with a clatter.

“Who’s there?” a second voice says. “Show yer fuckin’ self!”

“Fuck,” Zayn says, turns on his heel, and runs out the door. A few seconds later, there’s the sound of an engine starting, and then tires peeling away down the street.

“Fuck,” Louis mutters. Harry bites his lip.

“Well,” says the first voice again, and a figure comes out of the shadows to accompany it. “That was sudden. And quite rude.” The voice, it turns out, belongs to a slim girl with wide, dark eyes and chestnut hair, wearing head-to-toe baby pink and somehow managing to look threatening while doing so. She flicks her hair over her shoulder and looks Harry and Louis up and down. “What’re youse two doin’ here, then?”

Before they can respond, three other figures emerge from the shadows, all of them equally impressive and none of them looking particularly impressed.

“Hi,” the one with the freckles and intimidatingly high platform boots says, stepping towards them. “I’m Jesy. This is Leigh, Perrie, and Jade.”

“Nice to meet you,” Louis says. “You from around here?” He gives them a once-over, and Harry purses his lips. It’s not right to make judgments like that, even if Louis is probably right.

“No,” the blonde one—Perrie—says, “just passin’ through.” She’s got the same strange note to her voice that the first one—Jade—did, and Harry would put money on the two of them being from South Shields. His ear for accents is still quite good, which he appreciates.

“I know you,” Jesy says, the crease of her brow lessening and the corners of her mouth pulling up just slightly. “We’ve met before, haven’t we?”

“Harry?” Louis asks.

The words feel stuck in Harry’s throat. He does know her; he wanted to think he didn’t, but she knows him, and so the faint, blurred memory that’s been insistently pulsing at the back of his mind forces its way into the front, and he sees a crossroads at midnight, a young girl, an exchange. It was one of his first deals, back when Caroline was watching him like a hawk perched on his shoulder, or maybe a buzzard circling right above. She supervised him less as the years went on, as she became confident that she had shaped someone who would do her bidding even when she wasn’t around to watch, but back at the start she was there for nearly everything, and after he made each deal she would pull him close and tell him, right into the shell of his ear, what a good job he had done, how proud she was.

He can feel it, now, her lips at his ear, the sickly vibration, and it makes him lurch, wanting to vomit.

“Harry?” Louis says, coming closer to him, reaching out as if to touch him, and Harry jerks back with a pathetic sound, hands coming up in front of him. _Breathe,_ he tells himself. _Come on. Breathe._

When his vision clears, all of them are looking at him: Louis with confusion and worry; Leigh, Perrie, and Jade with wariness and slight concern; and Jesy with a knowingness that makes him want to vomit all over again. She’s a witch, and he’d given her her powers, and taken her soul in exchange.

He’s just beginning to process that information when Perrie claps her hands together and says, “Right! Hunters, are you?” Harry sees how Louis’ hand automatically twitches toward his Glock, and he thinks, _please don’t do anything rash._

“Yes,” Louis says, slowly. “Just passing through, heard about some weird accidents and thought we’d check it out.”

“Right,” Leigh says. “Pez, you knew the other one, right?”

“I did,” Perrie agrees. “Ladies, that was the ex I was telling youse about. Pain in my arse.”

“Ex?” Louis repeats. Harry elbows him.

Perrie rolls her eyes. “Yes, I’m afraid. Seems he hasn’t changed all that much.”

Louis laughs, sharp and bitter. “Sorry,” he says, looking mollified once he realizes he’s being stared at. “Just…yeah. Sorry.”

“Now, then,” Jesy says, “what can we do for you?”

“Um, well,” Louis starts, “we were just looking for hex bags.”

“Good thing we know where those are,” Leigh says, bending down and fishing one out from behind a cabinet. “We were just back to clean up, actually. That alright with you?” She raises an eyebrow at them.

Harry holds his hands up. “Fine,” he says. “Er, that’s totally okay, I mean—”

Leigh laughs. “You don’t have to be so nervous, love,” she says. “We’re nice witches.”

“Oi,” Jesy says, elbowing her. “Speak for y’self.”

“Nice witches?” Louis repeats.

“Yes,” Jade says. “We do exist.”

“Contrary to certain stereotypes propagated by hunters,” Perrie adds, sniffing.

Louis huffs. “I’m going to need a bit more elaboration than that.”

“Oh, for goodness’ sake,” Jesy sighs. “We only go after men who think they can get handsy with their wives or girlfriends.”

Louis frowns. “So what, you’re a vigilante justice group targeting domestic abusers? With witchcraft?”

“More or less,” Perrie says. “We have a hotline.”

He blinks. “That’s kind of cool,” he says, after a minute.

“Thanks,” Perrie says. “We think so.”

“‘S thanks to Harry here, really,” Jesy says, and _oh shit._ He can’t act quickly enough to stop it. “Girls, you remember I told youse how I got my magic from a nice young demon with lovely curly locks?”

“Harry?” Louis says from somewhere behind him. “What’s she talking about?”

Instead of answering, Harry promptly passes out.

*

He comes to a few minutes later, much to his chagrin, feeling like a right prat for not even having had the decency to lose consciousness for a respectable hour, and the first thing he notices is that he’s been moved onto the sofa, and that Louis and Jesy and the rest of them are huddled around a few feet away, speaking in low voices that freeze in the air.

“So, wait,” Louis says, “let me get this straight: you bargained your soul with Harry for your magic how long ago?”

“Bout six years,” Jesy says. “Give or take. And if we’re being technical, it was for my grimoire.”

“Right,” Louis says, letting out a low whistle through his teeth. “Huh. So that gives you, what, four years left?”

“Nah,” Jesy says. “Few months ago, I started feeling different, so we went to see a psychic, ‘n’ she said my soul wasn’t claimed anymore.”

“When you say a few months ago,” Louis says sharply, “any chance you mean last August?”

“I do,” Jesy says. “Pez, that’s when it was, aye?”

“It was,” Perrie agrees. “That was the month we spent in New York, wasn’t it?”

“It was,” Jade says. “It was so bleedin’ hot I thought we’d gone straight to Hell.”

“Why d’you ask?” Jesy cuts back in.

Harry feels the prickle of eyes on his back. “Just wondering,” Louis says. “Helps put a few things together.”

“Glad to be of service,” Leigh says, with an audible eye-roll. “Care to explain what you were doing with that scumball?”

Louis’ quiet for a second. “Zayn?”

“Is that his name,” Leigh mutters. “Yeah. Him.”

“We um…” Louis trails off, and Harry would bet money he’s rubbing the back of his neck and looking at the ground right now. “We used to be partners.”

“Oh my god,” Perrie murmurs. “Are you…” Without another word, she launches herself at Louis, in a blur of pastel pink hair and glitter, cupping his face in her hands and swaying back and forth. “You!” she squeals, delighted, and plants big wet kisses on both his cheeks. “Oh my god, I’ve been looking for you forever!”

“Pez,” Jade calls, “don’t smother the poor lad.”

“I’m not!” Perrie snaps back, before pulling Louis into another bone-crushing hug. “Oh my god! Sorry! This is just so exciting!”

“Um,” Louis manages to get out. “Hi?”

Seeming to snap back to consciousness, Perrie ceases squeezing him and instead holds his shoulders at arm’s length. “You’re the partner he was always talking about,” she says, voice full of wonder. “I half-thought he was making you up, no lie.”

“Um,” Louis repeats. “You’re not the demon he was running around with, though.”

She rolls her eyes. “Obviously. I’m not a demon at all, I’m a witch.”

“And you know Zayn how…?”

She shakes her head and laughs. “Okay! Rude of me! I’m Perrie. Zayn and I used to have a thing.”

“A thing?”

“Yes, a thing,” she says, waving a hand. “I would say like you two used to but I’m not sure you did. Plus he was weird about sexuality, you know. He was always going on about you, though. Louis this, Louis that. Louis says, blah blah blah. It was right irritating.”

“Oh.” Louis says. He looks frozen, like he’s forgotten how to move his muscles. “Uh…thanks?”

“So wait,” she says, turning to Harry. “Who’s this, then?”

“Um,” Louis says. “Harry?”

She rolls her eyes. “Well, obviously, that’s what you called him, but who is he to you?”

“Okay,” Harry says, deliberately, swinging his legs over the side of the sofa and waiting through the bloodrush.

“Love, you don’t look well,” Perrie says, scrambling over to his side and kneeling down to look into his eyes.

“He’s not,” Louis says. He presses the back of his hand to Harry’s forehead and curses. “We need to get you back to the motel,” Louis mutters. “Of course, Zayn’s taken the fucking car.”

“He’s like that,” Leigh remarks. “Cut and run. Always has been.”

“Do you _also_ have some kind of history with him?” Louis asks.

“Nah,” Jade says. “Leigh just holds Perrie’s grudges for her.”

“Fantastic,” Louis grumbles. “Well, he’s fucked off to god knows where and he’s not answering his phone, so he’ll have to understand. Can you guys help me get him back to the motel? It’s the Days Inn on Market Street.”

“No problem,” Perrie says brightly. “We’re parked just around the corner.”

“You have a car?”

“Of sorts,” Leigh says, glib. “We’ll show you. C’mon, it’ll only take two to carry him.”

“I’m fine,” Harry tries to say, but Louis shushes him.

“Quit being a hero,” Louis says, quietly, into the shell of his ear. “Lemme take care of you for once.”

*

The girls walk them back to the motel, casting some kind of charm that warms the air around them just slightly and keeps some of the flurries at bay. It’s not enough to keep Harry’s teeth from chattering and his knees from knocking together, but Louis keeps an arm around his shoulder, and once they get back to the room, having been given a slip of paper with the girls’ numbers on it, Louis immediately begins fussing over him, bundling him up in dry clothes and shoving a cup of tea in his hands while he crouches in front of Harry on the carpet, seemingly unsure where to put his hands, which end up all over, but mostly on Harry’s cheeks and jaw, where he touches him over and over, so gently.

Harry almost doesn’t notice when Zayn comes in. “The fuck is wrong with him?”

“Fuck off,” Louis says, not looking away from Harry or removing his hands from his face. They’re warm. “I need to take care of him.”

“I’m fine,” Harry protests weakly. He will be, given a few minutes in front of a space heater, but he’s kind of glad Louis reads the lie for what it is.

“You’re not,” Louis tells him, and then turns to Zayn. “Can this wait?”

“I will.”

“Whatever,” Louis mumbles under his breath. “Get a blanket, would you? And my first aid kit.” Harry’s wrapped up in a duvet, Louis underneath with him—smart, conserve body heat—and he vaguely registers Louis teasing his mouth open and dropping a little pill on the back of his tongue, stroking his throat so he swallows. “Good boy,” Louis whispers to him. “So good. Calm down for me, okay?”

Harry nods, already starting to feel a pleasant heaviness settle over him, calming the racing of his heart. It’s warm under here with Louis, who keeps up the rhythmic stroking of his hair until Harry slips away under his fingers, gone somewhere fuzzy and dark.

When he comes to, he’s alone, and cold.

“—changed,” he hears Zayn say. “Like, wow.”

“I haven’t,” Louis says sharply. “How do you mean?”

“No, I’m serious. Like, you just go so soft with him. I’ve never seen you like that.”

“We have history,” Louis says after a minute. Either Louis’ very generous in not calling him out on it or Harry’s actually very good at pretending to be asleep. He keeps it up, anxious for what Louis might have to say about him, what Zayn might, and if Louis would agree.

Zayn snorts. There’s another clink of glass. “Like you and I don’t?

Louis laughs, hollow and short. “We have a different kind of history, yeah.”

“What do you mean?”

“Don’t make me say it.”

“Say what?”

“Come on. Don’t play dumb.”

“Say it, Louis.”

There’s silence for a moment, and then. “You left. You walked out.”

“You showed me the door,” Zayn snaps back. “What was I supposed to do?”

“Not lying to me would be a start.”

“Right, because it was so easy to tell you the truth. You reacted so well.”

“I might’ve reacted better if you hadn’t fucking lied to me for almost a year solid. You lied and you snuck around behind my back and when I found out you fucking _left._ ”

“You did the same fucking thing!”

“ _What?_ ”

“You’re sleeping with a demon.”

A pause. “Harry?”

“Who else?”

“He’s not a demon, dickhead.”

“He used to be, though. I called Niall.”

“He wouldn’t have told you.”

“Well, no, but I put two and two together. You’re a hypocrite, you know that?”

“It’s not the same thing.”

“Bullshit, it’s not. That’s exactly what you couldn’t stand me for doing. You said so yourself.”

“Jesus Christ, that was part of it, but you’re leaving out the part where you _lied to me._ ”

“What does that matter?”

“Fuck you.”

“What?”

“You know why it matters.”

“I don’t. Enlighten me.”

“Don’t play dumb. It’s not cute.”

“What, expecting you to read my mind? Funny, cause that’s all you expected from me.”

“I _didn’t—_ ”

“Yeah, yeah, you’re doing the same thing.”

“I wasn’t fucking ready to _talk about that shit_ , Zayn, you fucking knew that. Don’t lie and say you didn’t.”

“Clearly you’re still not fucking ready because you won’t even _say_ it. It’s not that hard.”

“How would you know?”

Harry suddenly can’t bear to hear more of this, and he lets out a whimper that had been building in the back of his throat, turning onto his side like he’s having a nightmare. Hopefully that’s what it looks like. He’s never seen himself have one.

“Shit,” Louis says, and then his voice is so much closer. “Harry? Baby? C’mon, shh, you’re alright. Just a dream.” A warm hand rests between his shoulderblades, rubbing gently. “There you go, you’re okay.”

Harry’s about to pretend to wake up, and then Zayn says. “Christ, he’s got you whipped, huh?” and Louis’ hand vanishes from his back and his voice is shrill.

“Shut the fuck up.”

“I saw how he looked at me,” Zayn says, as if Louis hadn’t spoken.

“The fuck does that mean?”

“He’s jealous. You haven’t noticed him looking at me like he wants to put my head on a fucking spike?

Harry almost laughs out loud, or screams. He’s a little impressed with himself at his restraint, actually. _Shut up,_ he wants to say. _You hurt him. I_ do _want to put your head on a fucking spike._

Louis’ silent for several long beats. “Fuck off,” he says, then, quiet and firm. “I’m not dealing with this right now. Please leave.”

“Louis—”

“Get the fuck out,” Louis grunts. Harry can visualize the way his fists are clenching, the downturn of his mouth. He’s not angry—well, he’s not _mostly_ angry. He’s on the verge of tears and trying to clear out any witnesses.

“Fine,” Zayn says, his voice receding. The door clicks open. “Be that way.” It shuts, and all that’s left in the room is the whirr of the heater and Louis’ heavy breathing.

*

They don’t move for several hours, watching as the moon rises to its peak and then slips behind the clouds. “Love you so much,” Louis murmurs into Harry’s bare shoulder, flickering in the cast-off glow of the streetlamp. “So, so much.”

“Me too,” Harry says back. “More than I can say.”

Louis’ silent for several long minutes. “Do I hold onto things too long?” he asks, eventually. His inflection is neutral; Harry can’t tell what the agenda is, if there is one, so he tells the truth.

“Sometimes,” he says. “Other times you just hold on longer than other people would, but it’s not wrong.”

“How do you tell the difference?”

Harry shrugs. “I don’t know,” he says, and drops a kiss to Louis’ collarbone. “What do you think?”

Louis laughs softly. “Not fair,” he says. “You can’t just turn my question back on me.”

“Can’t I?” Harry nudges him in the side.

“No,” Louis says, with an audible pout. He props himself up on his elbows so that Harry can see the shine of his jutted-out lower lip, and press his thumb to the center of it. Louis bites the digit and smiles. “Rrrrr,” he says, Harry’s thumb still clamped between his teeth.

“Little lion cub,” Harry murmurs.

Louis bites down harder. “Watch who you’re calling little,” he says, garbled.

“Sorry,” Harry says, with a little smile. He takes the hand not currently attached to Louis’ mouth and cups the sharp cut of his jaw, leaning in to place a kiss on the tip of his nose. “You’re very big and scary and intimidating.”

“Damn right,” Louis grumbles. He drops Harry’s thumb and ducks down to kiss him, wet and soft. “Love you.”

“Love you too.”

Louis nuzzles their noses together. “Glad I didn’t let you go. Even if it would’ve been smart.”

“Me too,” Harry says, and kisses him hard, once, twice, three times. They fall back on the bed together, the sheets tangling around their ankles.

“Love you so much,” Harry pants into the sweat-slick skin stretched over Louis’ ribs, the bony cut of his pelvis, the delicate arch of his foot. All these tiny discoveries he feels so blessed to experience anew every day. He hopes he never stops.

He does find himself drifting, occasionally—perhaps too often. There are only so many acts two people can perform, only so many sensations, and Harry may have to come to terms with some of them being ruined, much as he doesn’t want to. But he’s learning a million new things, too, a thousand beautiful ways Louis’ body reacts to his touch and hundreds of soft sighing noises that set his skin on fire. It feels…sacred, sometimes, this. He wonders if it shouldn’t, if it’s sacrilege for him to even have the thought, but he decides he doesn’t much care, as long as he can have this. In his bolder times, he even thinks all of it—death, damnation, Hell, Caroline, and all the rest—was worth it, if it means that he gets this now.

If he gets, tonight, Louis opening him up on his fingers and tongue and pulling sounds from him that make him reflexively cringe, except that they’re matched by sounds of Louis’ own, as well, and that makes them okay. Okay to be this bare and vulnerable, because Louis is, too, and Louis knows how much that means. It’s sappy—he’s fully aware it’s sappy, and overly sentimental, and at the end of the day they’re just fucking, he can’t even bring himself to say _making love_ in any seriousness, but there is _something_ to it, some quiet reverence that he doesn’t know that he’ll ever get his fill of. He hopes he never does.

*

Zayn’s gone in the morning. Louis even breaks into his room to check—Harry wishes he wouldn’t, but he gets why he needs to—and all of his stuff is gone, his car disappeared from the parking lot with only a bare rectangle of pavement and some tire marks to show it was there in the first place. Louis doesn’t react much outwardly, just goes a little tight and quiet the way he does when he’s truly upset.

It’s Christmas Eve, and they’re more or less alone in the motel. The cleaning staff doesn’t come by—or at least Harry doesn’t notice—and Louis’ lying on the bed, fully dressed except for his bare feet, staring at the ceiling.

“It’s my birthday,” Louis says, suddenly and quietly. Harry holds in his noise of surprise. Louis seems to be able to tell. “Dunno why I didn’t say anything before, I just…I don’t know. I don’t like celebrating it.”

“Hmm,” Harry says. He can understand that; he feels ambivalent about his own, ever since he died. He came back above ground in mid-October, and he doesn’t feel like celebrating that, either. “Why not?”

Louis fiddles with the hem of his thermal. “I—just. Fuck. After, y’know, the, um, the fire and everything, it just…it wasn’t really a thing. I mean, god, it’s stupid, like on my twelfth birthday, I think it was, the first one I was with my dad for, I, um. I tried to run away.”

“Mhm,” Harry says, careful not to really react much.

“It was stupid, I was just…he left me in this motel, right, which was pretty normal, except he was supposed to be back quickly but then he called me and said it would be a while, and I had—fuck, I had like, tried to decorate the room for Christmas, ‘cause I figured since he was around when I was born, he’d remember, and try to make it back, but he didn’t even mention it when he said he was gonna be away longer, and I just. I lost it, I don’t know. I tried to get a bus but they wouldn’t let me on so I tried hitchhiking. Got a couple states away, actually. And then…this, um, this trucker, tried to—nevermind, I just. I got stranded somewhere in North Carolina and I don’t…I’m not sure how he found me, actually, but he was a good hunter, so. I don’t know. I ignored my birthday after that.”

There are parts—huge ones, chunks—Louis’ leaving out of that story, Harry knows, but there’s enough sketched out that Harry can fill in the rest, the picture of which makes his heart ache and his desire to bring Louis’ father back to life so he can kill him roar to new life, before he tames it. Anger isn’t what Louis needs right now.

“Happy Birthday,” Harry settles on, holding out a hand for Louis to take, then pulling him in and kissing his forehead. “What d’you want to do this year?”

Silence, and then, “I want to go home,” Louis says, so quietly Harry might not hear him were his ears not pricked to the slightest sound from him.

“Okay,” Harry says. “Home meaning—”

“Jersey,” Louis finishes for him.

Harry frowns. “Wanna try and get a rental, or…?”

“Got a better idea,” Louis says, cryptic as ever. He pulls his phone out of his pocket and presses a couple of buttons. Harry rolls his eyes at Louis’ persistent refusal to get a normal, decent phone, continuing to use the Motorola Razr which only holds a charge for an hour or so and doesn’t send texts half the time. He wonders if Louis would accept it if he were to get him a phone for Christmas. Or his birthday, he supposes.

“Hey, Liam,” Louis says, placing the phone on the table.

It moves slightly when Liam speaks, vibrating across the hard glass surface. “Tommo! How are you? Happy Birthday! Merry Christmas!”

“Little early on that one, Leemo,” Louis chuckles. “How are you?”

“Good, good,” Liam says. “Niall’s got me stringing popcorn and cranberries. My fingers might fall off.”

“Sucker,” Louis laughs. “That’s the worst job. Let me guess, he’s doing the gingerbread house himself?”

“Okay,” Liam says, “in all fairness, do you honestly think _that_ would be the job for me?”

“No. It’s a job for Harry, obviously.”

“Well, too bad he’s not here, then, isn’t it?”

Louis sighs. “Liam—”

“Wasn’t a criticism,” Liam says. “Y’okay?”

Louis laughs. “Pulling out the social worker moves on me already?”

“Shut up,” Liam whines. “God, am I not allowed to ask how you’re doing?”

“It was more the tone you used,” Harry chimes in. Louis winks at him.

“Forgive me for caring,” Liam says, with a long-suffering sigh, but there’s a laugh underneath.

“Finals go okay, by the way?” Louis asks.

“I think so.” Liam’s tone immediately goes anxious, and Harry can picture the way he’s probably chewing on his lip and bouncing his knee. “I’m nervous about my policy class, it’s just a lot of dates and numbers and stuff to remember, and then there’s writing the essays and stuff, and you know how I am about writing and spelling and stuff—”

“Liam,” Louis interrupts him, “you do realize you made it into the FBI, right?”

“It’s different,” Liam whines.

“It’s really not,” Louis says. “You’re gonna do great.”

“Thanks.” Liam sighs. “We’ll see.”

“Festivities going well?”

“Niall’s a bit of a tyrant.”

“As usual.”

“You’re on speakerphone!” Niall’s voice echoes faintly from somewhere far away.

“Love ya Nialler!”

“Are you guys coming back here, then? Christmas is a-comin’.”

“Well,” Louis says, glancing up at Harry, “we’re sort of having some car trouble at the moment.”

Liam groans. “Again? Seriously, Tommo, what is it with you and that car?”

Harry feels his eyebrows shoot up towards his hairline. _Well,_ he thinks, _that was tactful._

To his absolute shock, Louis just laughs. It could even be described as a giggle; his eyes crinkle at the corners and everything. “I know,” he says. “It’s getting ridiculous, isn’t it?” There’s a mournful note to his voice, and something else Harry doesn’t know how to place. A faint glow of something, warm and bright.

“Harry,” Louis says, covering the receiver with his hand, “how would you feel about spending Christmas with my sisters?”

Harry’s pretty sure he looks like a largemouth bass when Louis says that, and Louis seems to think so too, if the way his face scrunches up is any indication.

“I’ll take that as a yes, then,” Louis says, and uncovers the phone. “Hey, Leemo, looks like we’re going to spend Christmas with my sisters. See you for New Years’?”

“Oh!” Liam’s shock is poorly concealed, but he sounds delighted. “Yeah, sure, I mean, have fun! We’ll just be…here…”

“You don’t have to sound like such a kicked puppy,” Harry snickers. “‘S not like you’re all by yourself out there.”

“No,” Liam says, “but it is lonelier since Stasha moved, you know that.”

“Oh my god, you’re an empty-nester,” Louis mutters. “I’m going to call her and tell her she has to visit. I’m not going to survive much more of the moping.”

Liam’s tone brightens. “You think she would? Her aunt would let her, right? Maybe for New Year’s, as well.”

“Sounds good,” Louis says. “Anyway, Haz and I met some new friends, so we’re gonna hitch a ride with them.”

“What are you gonna do with the junks—I mean the car?”

Louis rolls his eyes. “Ha, ha. I heard that.”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Louis says, chewing on his thumbnail. “‘Sides, ‘s probably time I started shopping for a trade-in, huh?”

Harry drops the cup he had forgotten he was holding; it falls to the carpet with a hollow _thunk._ Louis whirls to look at him, arching his eyebrows. _You okay?_ He mouths. Harry nods, and Louis gives him one of those bright, beaming smiles that warm Harry to his core.

“Mhm. I think this is a really positive step for you, Louis.”

Louis rolls his eyes. “Well, glad I’ve got your approval, then.”

“You know what I mean,” Liam sighs.

“I do,” Louis says, then turns to Harry. “Let’s hit the road. Get your suitcase and stuff together, yeah?”

“Okay,” Harry says, slightly shellshocked.

“Brilliant. Bye, Liam!” Louis snaps the phone shut, and then opens it back up, hitting a couple of buttons and putting it back to his ear. “Do you want Dunkin’ Donuts?” he says to Harry, while it’s ringing.

Harry nods so fast he worries for a second he might be shaking his brain loose.

“Hey Lotts,” Louis says brightly. “Are you still up to have us for Christmas?” He pauses for a second. “Awesome. We’re in the Berkshires, so if we hit the road now we’ll be there in a few hours.” He smiles. “Looking forward to seeing you, too, kiddo.” With that, he shuts the phone and puts it in his pocket.

“Um,” Harry says, making some kind of hand gesture that manages to toss a sock across the room, “how exactly are we getting from here to New Jersey without a car?”

“Oh ye of little faith,” Louis says, grinning and packing away sawed-off rifles. “I always have a back-up plan.”

As if on cue, a horn beeps outside, and Louis inclines his head toward the window. Sure enough, when Harry peeks past the curtain, there’s a pink caravan parked outside, and four faces visible in the windshield. Probably on cue, then, come to think of it. Witches can swing shit like that.

Harry feels his eyes, traitorously, get a little wet.

Louis seems to read the thought on his face, and he nods. “Sometimes,” he says, very quietly, “you’ve just…I dunno. You’ve gotta…take what you can get.”

“Mhm,” Harry says, waiting for Louis to elaborate.

He does. “I just…I was always so so sure if I could just figure out the right way to act, the right way to be, that like…god, it sounds stupid, doesn’t it? That I could stop bad things from happening by trying to make myself good enough.”

 _You are good enough,_ Harry thinks, and swallows it down. _You always were._ “It makes sense that you would think like that,” he says, instead. “I get it.”

Louis chuckles. “Well. That’s very validating of you. I’m just saying, it shouldn’t matter so much to me. I don’t want it to. I spent half my damn life trying to get my dad’s approval and now he’s dead and I’m still trying to get him to like me.”

“Sorry,” Jesy interrupts, standing underneath the suddenly and inexplicably open window, “but I was just being rude and eavesdropping on your conversation and I wanted to let you know it’s a load of bollocks that your dad was like that, but you don’t have to moon over it the rest of your life.”

She points at Harry. “Listen, wee one,” Jesy says, “not everybody gets a second chance, y’hear? But sometimes you do, and it’s up to you to make the best of it. You know how I learned that?”

Harry shakes his head.

She wiggles her nose. “ _You,_ silly. That’s what you gave me. Twice, come to think of it.” She laughs, then. “Don’t look at me like that, I’m not having you on. I’m so glad I made that deal with you. Not that I’m not also glad I’m no longer damned. I’m glad I found these girls and that we’re doing what we do, ‘cos I think we make the world a better place. At least one with fewer scumbags, innit?”

Harry feels a smile pulling at the corner of his mouth. “Guess so.” He feels Louis squeeze his hand.

“Speaking of,” Louis says, “What’s the plan for Esther and Grace and them?”

“Well,” Perrie says, “Grace is headed back to her mum’s, as you know. Alan’s the only one who’s still alive, unfortunately, but I think we got the message through that he’d lose more than his hands if he tried to put them on Esther again. We’re sticking around for a while to help them all get settled, after we drive you home.”

“You’ve got this down to a science, huh?” Louis says, sounding impressed. He and Harry take another quick scan of the room and then hoist their bags over their shoulders and shuffle out into the slushy parking lot, where they clamber into the caravan, the girls piling in behind them.

“Not exactly,” Leigh says, a little out of breath. “It’s kind of a crapshoot.” She settles behind the steering wheel.

Jesy beams. “You two are really quite lovely, y’know,” she says, looking back at Louis and Harry.

Leigh pushes the button to turn the radio on, and a familiar chord progression, bitter and sweet, starts up.

_It was Christmas Eve, babe  
In the drunk tank  
An old man said to me:   
_ _"I won't see another one."_

_And then they sang a song_  
The rare old mountain dew  
I turned my face away  
And dreamed about you

 _Got on a lucky one_  
Came in eighteen to one  
I've got a feeling  
This year's for me and you

 _So Happy Christmas_  
I love you, baby  
I can see a better time  
When all our dreams come true

 *

**Author's Note:**

> ~If you liked it then you should put a comment on it~
> 
>  
> 
> [~reblogging is also cool~](http://churchrat.tumblr.com/post/143407420900/fic-run-like-the-devil-hl-complete-twc)


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